"Have mercy on me, my God, have mercy on me,
for in you I take refuge. I will take refuge in the shadow of your wings
until the disaster has passed." (Ps. 57:1 NIV)
I believe in prayer. I believe in the peace
and contentment of talking to Him. I did not realize the depth and
breadth of it all, however, until the summer of 2003. I was already a 4
year volunteer with Answers2Prayer, but still a baby compared to other
intercessors. Spending a lot of time with difficult patients had drained
the spunk out of me.
That fateful day in May, I was assigned to be
on special nursing duty with an important lady, a dean at a major
California University. She was dying of pancreatic cancer and had
requested to spend her last days at home. She had had many nurses prior
to me but had cursed them, insulted them and sent them all away. In my
case, God was gracious, and the lady actually smiled at me as I walked
in to take over her care.
I was on the second watch of my second day and
had just gotten up to take the lady's blood pressure. I laid my Bible on
the chair and walked over to the patient when all of a sudden my
surroundings turned gray. My feet felt heavy, like lead, and I barely
made it to the patient's side before I collapsed. As I began to pray, my
heart could only muster one word: "Jesus!"
Terrified, the patient screamed, "Help she's
dead!" Afraid that I might, indeed, be passing away, the family rushed
me to the closest Kaiser hospital in town.
It was a busy night in the emergency room. I
was assigned an emergency bed, I was pumped with medicine through an IV,
and they connected me to various monitors. Around this time, I regained
consciousness, and I very clearly heard my pastor's voice praying for
me. I turned to my nurse: "Is my pastor here?"
The nurse looked at me funny. "Ma'am there is
no pastor here." She then pulls open the curtains to show me no one was
there. "You had better rest," she said. "It's 3 am. The doctor wants you
here for a few days. We're moving you to a room upstairs."
I closed my eyes then, and as I listened, the
unseen praying voice of my pastor continued.
I had barely been put into my room when there
was a knock on the door. It opened to admit my church's music pastor and
his son. He said, "May I pray with you?"
I nodded, wondering how he knew I was in the
hospital.
As if sensing my question, the music pastor
explained: "Our Pastor was in prayer tonight when someone who didn't
identify himself called and told him one of his church members was in
this hospital. They even gave a room number."
That was really, really strange, because the
room had not even come available until just moments before he walked
into my room.... I would later learn that no one at the hospital had
called hom. How could anyone have known?
I started feeling better the following day. I
couldn't walk without assistance, but I could speak, eat and recognize
people. Volunteers from my church began coming by to help me with
dressing and toileting. God was merciful to me. I was a recipient of one
of His miracles of mercy that day.
Praise God!
Candy Araneta
The Illustrator: This daily newsletter is dedicated to encouraging
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